Lawrence R. Klein, Economist and Nobel Prize Winner, Passes Away

October 20, 2013

Lawrence R. Klein, Benjamin Franklin Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Pennsylvania and recipient of the Nobel Prize, died October 20, 2013.

Klein was a member of the economics department at Penn from 1958 until his retirement in 1991, though he continued as an active researcher and valued colleague long after his formal retirement. He pioneered the development of macroeconometric models used to predict global economic trends. While many economists believed another depression would occur in the aftermath of World War II, Klein rightly predicted a flourishing economy, based on, among other things, unsatisfied demand for consumer goods during wartime and the purchasing power of returning soldiers.

In 1980, Klein won the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for creating econometric models and applying them to economic fluctuations and policies. His Nobel citation states that "few, if any, research workers in the empirical field of economic science have had so many successors and such a large impact as Lawrence Klein."

At Penn, Professor Klein led the graduate group in economics for more than 20 years, taught undergraduates in the honors program, and mentored more graduate students and directed more doctoral theses per year than any other departmental member. Klein also created the Penn Institute for Economic Research (PIER), which enhanced the University's role as one of the leading institutions in the world to study economics.